Quote:
Originally Posted by Busy Bee
There's more than one way to skin a cat. Corporate desire for plentiful parking does not automatically equal this front facing and wraparound parking format that so often gets built. In an urban environment, short of building a zero parking store, which they claim are money losers and they clearly hate except for the highest pedestrian areas, they could push the building to the sidewalk lot line, either with full plate glass glazing and an entrance in the corner with a deep galley parking lot. Architectural elements could continue along the sidewalk streetwall creating the feeling of a full building. There are ways to do it better. As someone said before, i believe the reason it's not in many cases is laziness but equally to blame is a lack of imagination.
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The reason isn't because of laziness, the reason is because CVS/Walgreens don't need to most of the time. The sole purpose of these companies is to drive shareholder value not design beautiful buildings or ped friendly buildings. It is much more cost effective to have a one-size fits all approach to design, where they know exactly the lot size they need, and can throw the buildings up in a matter of months. Stores with no parking/little parking almost certainly perform worse, that is not good for shareholders.
It is 100% on the jurisdiction to require design standards, if they so wish. In the example of Chicago, it should be expected that many stores on the fringe of the city would close and they would move into neighboring suburbs to avoid such design, if they were forced.
These businesses are driven by profit, it's really that simple.